Tunisia: The Alarming Situation of Smoking and its Fatal Consequences

Tunisia has been working for years to enact new laws and launch campaigns to warn about the dangers of smoking, with the aim of combating the high rates of smokers that have increased among adolescents and young men, both men and women, and have become one of the most important factors that cause cases of serious diseases such as cancer, shortness of breath, and others.

Hatem Bouziane, head of the Tunisian Anti-Smoking Alliance, an organization established in May 2022 and includes more than 10 medical, scientific, civil and private organizations working to combat tobacco use, revealed that the alarming figures related to the number of smokers in Tunisia require great efforts to reduce bleeding deaths. directly caused by smoking.

Shocking numbers

• Bouziane told Sky News Arabia, “The numbers of smoking consumption and its dangerous health repercussions are terrifying and terrifying, as half of Tunisian men smoke tobacco, and this percentage rises to 65 percent in the age group between 25 and 65 years, and these indicators put Tunisia in the rank The first Arab.

• According to Bouziane, the indicators of smoking among Tunisian women are inaccurate, given that studies carried out by study offices or anti-smoking associations are sometimes conducted in the presence of the family, and many women hide their tobacco consumption for reasons related to customs and traditions, but the number of women who smoke cigarettes in Tunisia is high.

• Smoking causes the death of more than 13,000 Tunisians annually, at a rate of 30 to 40 deaths per day, including more than 2,600 people who died due to passive smoking or living with a smoker at home, office or other places.

• Bouziane confirmed that his association completed the statistics in cooperation with the Ministry of Health and with the support of the World Health Organization in late 2022, and concluded that Tunisia is the first with Jordan and Lebanon in the percentage of smokers, but Tunisia is the first in death rates due to smoking.

• The head of the Tunisian Anti-Smoking Coalition reveals that the economic repercussions of the phenomenon of tobacco consumption are very dire, as Tunisia loses 2 percent of the gross national product as a result of the high percentage of smokers, due to the high number of days of absence from work and the import of special medicines for treatment of diseases caused by tobacco.

• 50 percent of smokers die before the age of 65 because of smoking, which is the main cause of lung cancer, as 90 percent of this type of tumor is caused by smoking.

• Bouziane adds: “It is known that smoking is a kind of addiction, and every addiction phenomenon requires great efforts and faces greater difficulties in dealing with it and getting out of it. We are working under the supervision of the World Health Organization and in cooperation with dozens of scientific societies and others to reduce the number of smokers in Tunisia, but there are other parties We have to confront them, which are the tobacco manufacturers with commercial goals and profit goals.”

Active organizations in the context of combating the high rate of tobacco use rely on awareness first and then deterrence, by enacting laws that compel public and private spaces to engage in efforts to combat this phenomenon by allocating secluded places for smokers or abolishing tobacco use within them.

In the year 2022, according to the head of the Tunisian coalition, Tunisia made great gains in its war against the high rates of smoking, as cigarette packs obligatorily bear an image of lung cancer or bladder cancer, with phrases that include indicating that smoking is fatal.

Many associations defending children’s rights have entered into anti-smoking campaigns, by launching campaigns to prevent the spread of cigarette kiosks and shops near schools, institutes and educational institutions, with the aim of reducing children and adolescents falling into the danger of cigarette use.

Free addiction treatment clinics

In the same context, Tunisia established years ago private clinics or in hospitals to treat cigarette addiction, where specialized doctors supervise the reception of smokers and subject them to treatment sessions with the aim of quitting smoking, and this experience achieved remarkable success, according to Bouziane.

On the other hand, Donia Gharbi Kilani, a physician supervising the smoking cessation unit in the regional public health department in the capital, Tunis, who has specialized in dealing with smokers for more than 20 years, says that “the risks that threaten smokers are more than can be described, as the phenomenon has turned into It is like a pandemic, which necessitates ringing the alarm bell, especially for the age group between 12 and 18 years old, that is, adolescents and children who are still feeling the first breaths of cigarettes, unaware of the danger this poses to their health.

And she added to “Sky News Arabia”: “Through my experience in a public hospital in Tunisia, there is an acknowledgment that smoking is a deadly danger and that the family is the first building block on which the basis for protecting childhood from falling into the epicenter of cigarette abuse must be built.”

The spokeswoman says, “Tunisia has all the capabilities to succeed in its war against the high rate of smokers and the health, economic and environmental damage it causes, but this requires a strong will from the family to protect young people, and continuous measures from specialized structures.”